Genuine connection and how to establish it

It is quite significant to be able to understand what genuine connection in the digital marketing world is. Cutting through the clutter, and bridging worlds between you and the consumer is often key to creating enduring, dynamic relationships that turn fans into loyal customers. Crucially, a story needs to told; its words then, are meant to turn pages into beloved bookmarks your fans come to recognise and revisit.

Here are the digital marketing guidelines towards doing so:

Two-way conversations

Yes, you are the brand. First thing that comes to mind is that your job is to feed your audience valuable information through proper implementation of your digital marketing strategy. Thing is, what information do they actually need? There are questions that can’t be directly answered through your website’s FAQs or your daily social media posts. Let them ask and try to answer as honest as possible.

Know your brand more than anyone else

For your answers to be laid down naturally, do your homework. Digital marketing entails reviewing and learning about your brand by heart. Once your viewer pops a question, make it a goal to answer it with much knowledge needed to earn your audience’s trust. This can help you earn genuine connections most effectively.

Eliminate consumer doubts

Be transparent. You need to be able to sell your product or service, but don’t let this be the main recipe to your marketing communications strategy. Don’t make your audience sense your sales agenda. Instead, implement a content marketing strategy wherein you put yourself in the position of your audience and educate them according to what you need to know as a consumer. In some situations, presenting honest pros and cons can be fairly helpful too. In this way, you can leave a space for your audience to adjust and not expect too much. And ultimately, learn how to admit mistakes in a professional manner.

Never leave your online audience

In online marketing, not only should you establish your brand’s online presence, but you also need to engage audience effectively. Your followers may not be directly your customers, but they can be key influencers. Educating and building relationships with them give your brand more opportunities and make your digital marketing efforts more effective. Accumulating larger networks should also mean accumulating trust.

Creativity is the key

How would you be able to converse with your audience if you can’t get their attention in the first place? Online users nowadays are smarter than we think. Ever wonder why poorly taken videos and photos sometimes go viral? It’s because the human factor is present. Digital marketing creativity these days aren’t too technical. It does not necessarily mean to be aesthetically perfect. Most times it’s just uniquely real.

Know more about establishing genuine connection, content and social media marketing. Contact digital agency in Singapore, IH Digital.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Goldheart Jewelry

Singapore, 16 December 2014 – Goldheart Jewelry shines on as it succeeds in acquiring more followers through its very first contest on Instagram. The brand’s Instagram page followers have increased 78% within barely two weeks’ time. It went up to a total of 690 from the pre-contest count of 386.

Running from 31 October to 14 November, Goldheart Jewelry’s Favourite Pure Love Moment Photo Contest on Instagram was well-received by its audience. In effect, its Instagram page garnered 304 new followers during the contest period. Submitted entries can be viewed via the hashtag search tool.

How the photo contest was implemented was indeed trouble-free for participants. Simply by using the hashtags #favouritepurelovemoment and #goldheartjewelry with a caption in an Instagram couple-themed photo will give participants the chance to take home the posted $500 Goldheart vouchers. The contest, exhibiting clear social media marketing plan, gained vast attention with some participants making use of their previously posted Instagram photos and placing the contest hashtags as comments to join in.

Featuring Inked Fingers’ beautifully presented Pure Love Photo Diary, the contest was implemented in line with Goldheart Jewelry’s launch of the new wedding bands collection, Sainte Pure. Through this photo contest, Goldheart Jewelry has successfully positioned its brand and products as a leader in the Love and Romance segment.

Holiday Travel Online Sharing

As the holidays approach, many people, groups and families get ready for their holiday travel. A lot of people are excited as we near to the day we swing to another year. It means holiday – Christmas and New Year celebration, where friends and families come together, bond and travel. It is not surprising that in this modernizing world, social media will become every traveler’s resource when planning about their holiday travel. Why? Because what people need to know are reviews from first-hand experiences in order to ensure that they get the best that they can expect when they travel. On this part of travel decision-making, travel sites with social interaction such as TripAdvisor become very useful for a lot of travelers.

In the next two months, topics about travel will certainly hit the social media world. Your social media friends and contacts will be sharing their travel experiences online. It is therefore brilliant to present your brand in a way that can be of support to this topic. In any part of the world, numerous people will be travelling. And whatever brand you hold, don’t overlook to ride with this trend as people will be searching a lot of it online, not to mention interacting on the social media only to get valuable information.

Asia Travel Trends

A reason to keep your brand’s social media presence in Asia is becoming more obvious around the world today. Based on the findings of ITB World Travel Trends Report, “Asia continues to be the driving force in international tourism.” Interestingly, as Asians become huge contributors to the travel market globally, most Asians also prefer to make their holiday travel within their own continent. Asia becoming the most popular destination around the world will only be followed by Europe and North America. Furthermore, growth is seen to continue in Asia. IPK International predicts that in the coming year (2015), Asian citizens will make above-average number of trips that can possibly outnumber other nations in terms of outbound travel market.

The Social Media Effect

Travel is becoming even more social these days. Travel bloggers are the biggest influencers on travelers’ behaviours. They can be social voices about travel brands and ideas! As people become more skilled in online research, online users are taking extra steps to use social media as a tool to get information about travel destinations, tips and reviews. Social media is becoming an integral part of travel planning. This month, as the holidays near, people around the world is expected to flood the online sphere with holiday topics and of course, holiday travel content.

Using social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube can be beneficial to your brand and your audience as well. As a marketer, you must make more use of social media in trying to influence audience’s behaviour towards travel. These days, many people are busy trying to consider options for their holiday travel destination. These people turn to the Internet to search, read reviews and be inspired through videos and images. This will be the perfect time to grab the online users’ attention and shift them to your brand through content. Travel and leisure brands have the best opportunity this holiday season!

Social media and online users are becoming smarter in selecting worthy-to-read content. Time is also becoming a big factor in today’s browsing experience among online users. That said, it is apparent that your market is more likely to search for valuable content. For instance, they can easily distinguish user-generated and professionally made videos. What you need to ensure as a marketer is giving out pleasing and valuable holiday travel information, and a smooth online experience to online users.

Digital trends on the rise

The world is fast forwarding as we come to experience the evolution of amazing digital trends such as the social media. One thing to keep in mind as a marketer is to keep up with these trends. As we enter another year, more are to be expected in the digital world. It’s not too late to make a step to ensure that our brand enters 2015 equipped to compete in the pool of rising marketers.

As a brand marketer, you need to think ahead. Not just of your market, but of your competitors as well. The year 2014 made a mark in the fast-rising trends on the social media. Hence, your plans now must include the improvement in your strategy for 2015 with regards to digital marketing and social media planning. The following list of rising trends can help you implement a more efficient marketing plan for the year ahead.

TREND #1: The rise of mobile continues

Do you know that people are seen to spend a lot on mobile in the following years? Sure you do! As seen evidently around the world, people get updated about trends, news and connections through a tap on their mobile phone screens. Needless to say, mobile is going to be a good way to interact with your audience in the coming year. So gear up! Make sure everything you implement is mobile-friendly – be it emails, website, apps and images.

TREND #2: More investment on social media advertising

If there’s one thing that you need to keep out of your mind as marketer, it is thinking that “social is a free-place market.” No, it’s actually not. In fact, social advertising spend continues to rise and ad products will continue to be introduced in the digital marketplace. It is not very surprising if by 2015 we see more increase in digital ad spend. Thus, you need to prepare for a smart move when it comes to investing on social advertising. Consult with a social media agency and take on the best digital practice for your brand.

TREND #3: Content still reigns!

Content is King! What your audience want is mainly content. Images, texts and videos are all that online users search for and spend time on. Users are becoming a lot smarter these days when it comes to choosing the content that they will view online. So the better the quality and the more relevant your content is, the better your exposure can go on the digital sphere. Remember to make your content informative, meaningful and interesting as it will always be the centre of your digital marketing efforts.

TREND #4: Social videos

Although YouTube is very famous when speaking about videos, there are more medium for video viewing that are becoming well-known too. Facebook video for instance, was announced to have more views this year than on YouTube. Social videos, either long or short, have a place in the digital marketing sphere in 2015. There will be a lot to watch out for on social video channels such as Vine, Instagram and a lot more. So better keep up with this digital trend and don’t forget to stay in the loop when advertising through videos!

TREND #5: The use of more digital channels other than Facebook

Although Facebook is seen as the top when it comes to social media, other digital channels are seen to be sprouting. And interestingly, these other channels are in fact helping a lot of marketers too. Twitter, of course, is one. But as a digital marketer, you must be able to find out which channel your audience spend most time on. Facebook may get the biggest cut in users’ spending time, but a lot of your audience are also looking for something that is most relevant to them. What you need to do is to look for the best digital channels that can provide the best customisation and personalisation strategies that will work more effectively for your audience. Keeping up with digital trends include targeting your audience right. Try to consider working on other channels too such as Google Plus and other blogging mediums.

Christmas Digital Marketing is Imperative

As the world shifts to a holiday mode as December approaches, Christmas digital marketing moves are becoming more significant. Marketers usually prepare for the holiday season before anyone else does. And digital marketing is the most efficient way to reach a vast number of audiences the fastest way. But as the use of digital marketing strategies heap on during the Christmas season, you need to find a way to become the top among the competing pool of marketers.

We’ve compiled a list of items that you can follow now. It’s not too late to make sure that your digital marketing moves become successful. Read through it and keep it in mind as you reach your goal to have a prosperous Christmas digital marketing success.

Website – Your most important marketing tool

Your website is the image of your business. To keep up with other brands’ Christmas digital marketing moves, keep your website updated and informative. And of course, make sure that it has a responsive web design. Many people will be shopping for Christmas. Don’t miss this chance of attracting people’s attention toward your website.

Always invest in social media

Christmas is all about happiness, sharing and giving. This is what your audience is thinking about as Christmas day comes nearer. Food, presents or travel, for instance. What else can be better than feeding your audience about what they need for the holidays? You can only do this through social media. Social media is one of the best ways to relate and communicate with your audience as you impart your brand identity with them. Be actively present during this special season. Try to stand out from the rest by implementing the best campaign and content strategy for your brand!

Integrate your campaign in different platforms

Sure website is important. So as the different social media channels. But what marketers need to decide about is picking out the best digital platforms for their brand. There’s Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube and of course, the brand’s very own website. Your brand’s Christmas digital marketing campaign should be actively flashing all over your brand’s platforms. It’s Christmas season! So you need to make sure that your voice is heard amid the pool of contents flooding the news feeds of your audience. But remember, this is exactly different from spamming. And you wouldn’t want your audience to consider your brand a spam.

Make it festive, interesting and unique

Try to be unique. All your competitors will be flashing festive images that are related to Christmas. So remember that if you join the trend, you risk remaining unnoticed. Make your audience feel the festive season through your contents and Christmas digital marketing campaign, but be sure to make it unique. Be creative and keep your brand rules in mind as you push for your campaign. Tip: Sometimes a nostalgic feel or idea works, but it’s up to you how to make your campaign work. Know your audience well.

Update your website’s SEO

Is your website following the latest SEO guidelines? People will be searching a lot these days. So if your website is not competing in the search engines, you risk losing a lot of customers. It is best to ensure that your website is ranking up on the search.

Make it personal

Aside from making your Christmas digital marketing move a creative one, using a personal approach can make your brand win too! How? Today, email marketing is becoming one of the best digital marketing approaches once again. It was once said to be an old approach. But once implemented with a good strategy, it can win you big time! Many marketers are once again going back to the old approach but with a different approach this time. Now it’s more interesting, more personal and catchier.

Thought leadership and your brand

What is thought leadership? And what does the digital world needs from it? As billions of digital content populate the web today, online users tend to narrow down their searches, be smarter in typing in their search keywords, and ultimately, become hungry for the best content to trust. Content developers are now instigating more intelligent online strategies through high-quality content. Thought leadership is being able to establish credibility and authority through opinions, innovative solutions, unique perspective, newest strategy and best answers to consumers’ major questions. Building this smooth brand-consumer relationship requires a strategy to ensure the effectiveness of all content that will be laid upon the audience. Thought leaders set as inspirations, a primary information source and a driving force to take on challenges faced by the audience.

Making use of the social media

With today’s fast-advancing technology, thought leadership is becoming a significant point in effectively differentiating a brand from its competitors. Reasons to this continuously become more apparent as social media grow to be a huge portion of most consumers’ time and lifestyle.

To effectively become a thought leader, the following must be kept as part of your digital and content strategy:

Know your goals

Remember why your brand is present in the first place. With the help of people’s feedback in the digital social sphere, you can establish a specific goal. Communicating all things about brand to your audience requires your clear understanding of your brand’s purpose.  Knowing what you want to accomplish helps to effectively define your next moves. Do you want to be a medium for customers who want advices about the industry you belong to? Which is more valuable to you – being recognised or being a basis for recognitions? Set your goals and start crafting your digital strategy according to your brand’s purpose.

Set your unique voice and character

Who will your audience expect you to be? A thought leader carries a distinct identity that makes you on top of your industry. Identify your character, voice and values. Be consistent and never allow anything (big or small) that might shatter the authenticity of your identity. Remember, customers will always trust a genuine identity.

Be the expert that anyone can turn to

You are a leader, so continue to be one. Thought leadership must not be a one-time execution. It is a continuous process wherein you need to feed yourself with knowledge, skills and expertise. The Internet today is an open resource wherein answers can be uncovered without difficulty. Bear in mind that what you need to offer to your audience must be unique, the best, and authentic. When a question arises, be prepared with the best answers and solutions. And you can only do that by opening your mind to the continuous process of learning. Never stop. Be your audience’s greatest mentor by providing information that adds value to your audience.

Create a content strategy

When building thought leadership through the social media, one thing you can never miss is a thorough content strategy. It is essential because your plans, steps and all information that supports your plan will be included in your content strategy. It will define a huge chunk of your entire brand execution. How will you present your brand in the social media? How will you engage your audience? How will you keep your brand interesting?

Build your social online presence

Establishing presence in the social media is definitely a must in today’s digital world. In order to build thought leadership, your online presence must be known to your audience. They need to know that you can be easily reached to provide information and answers to their queries. In this way, you can get your audience to participate in sharing your information. Your brand’s exposure in different online portals is something that you can work on. How can you do this? Participate in forums, actively answer questions with expert contribution, be part of conversations, advices, tips and ensure that all content you provide are high-quality and relevant. Make use of the social media to present your expertise effectively.

Crisis management is imperative

Reputation is a top priority in every business. It is therefore a need more than merely a support to understand the information about crisis management before any marketing action takes place.

Today’s advancing technology leaves every brand extremely open to criticisms. Be it minor issue or immense, digital crisis should be dealt with properly. So what if your brand is faced with an extreme criticism that may have started from a single influencer and rapidly growing to be very negatively noticeable for your brand? What must marketers keep in mind in today’s advancing marketing moves? Two things: First is to skillfully know how to handle a challenge to your brand’s reputation in the digital world; and second is even better — to adeptly avoid crisis all the time. Here are the things that you can’t miss to put into action when handling an ensuing online crisis:

Communicate with the influencer privately

People say you can’t please everybody. True enough! But because you are trying to sell your brand’s products and services, you need to try to achieve zero crises; or else, this can lead to an uncontrollable hit on your brand’s reputation that will sooner or later hurt your business. So best thing to do is find the root of the growing feedback and start communicating privately through a private message to address their issue. Tip: Make sure to make a genuine approach. You wouldn’t want to make the crisis worse.

Get rid of the gaps

This is the center of crisis management. Communicate well and respond. Don’t leave gray areas unresolved among your audience. Customers ask because they look forward to something. Leaving them wondering about your product or service may reflect your brand negatively. There’s nothing wrong in saying your apologies when you did something wrong. It makes your customers more at ease to know that you understand their issue.

Respond swiftly

Stop everything and put digital crisis in your Urgent task list. Issues need to be resolved quickly. For customers, time is more than gold (especially for those who are terribly furious). You need to let your customers know that your concern for them is never vanishing. So update them, communicate with concern and respond to their queries as soon as possible.

Be genuine and transparent

People online are more clever than you think. Keep in mind that in times of crisis, people can have more reasons to think negatively about your brand’s reputation. Don’t allow this to happen. Being transparent about the situation will make things better. Admit your fault and thoughtfully respond to your customers. Tip: Treat them as part of your growing brand’s family, not merely a customer.

Always keep a crisis management team ready

Panic won’t help. Never ever lose control in digital crisis situations Better yet, always ensure that your crisis management team is in place to act on the situation quickly.

Community management experience is crucial

Your community manager will be the voice representing your brand. How they deal with crisis on the social media, especially in executing quick actions and responses, will weigh big in times of crisis. Get a professional, a good communicator and someone who understands your brand by heart to do these crisis management things for you.

Social media planning and engagement has truly come full circle across the most diverse of industries, particularly in airline businesses. With the need to immediately connect to target audiences, airline companies demand competitive digital media exposure to ensure return of investments. Such is the story of Cebu Pacific Japan – a success story worthy of telling.

Cebu Pacific Air is one of the most renowned airline companies in the Philippines, offering comfortable, convenient budget trips to and from the Philippines. Initially focusing on domestic flights before venturing international, this year it has expanded its reach to Japan with three destinations – Osaka, Nagoya and Tokyo. This expansion meant that Cebu Pacific had to target local Japanese travelers and Filipino residents in Japan, necessitating considerable digital presence to effectively establish brand awareness in these key markets.

 Digital Polaris

In lieu of the need for proper digital positioning and exposure, IH Digital serves as Cebu Pacific Air’s guiding light to properly strategise its digital efforts and ensure that all aspects are executed properly. Exhaustive research, aided with strategic execution, resulted to a highly successful online campaign. To this date, Cebu Pacific Japan continues to move further on the right direction with its digital efforts.

 Beyond the Benchmark

Effective targeting and positioning of Cebu Pacific Japan in the Digital space has led to a solid online presence with its dynamic online audience from social media platforms and even in search engines. IH Digital’s proprietary analytics tool, the iAnalytics, proved that the campaigns for Cebu Pac Japan have been working well above the industry standards.

 Bottom-line: Increased ROI

Statistics is nothing without significant conversions, which makes Cebu Pacific Japan a true success story in terms of harnessing the power of digital media and advertising. IH Digital’s continuous collaboration with Cebu Pacific Air has resulted to increased conversion as well as website transactions, through close monitoring and thorough research.

The Future is Flying High

Given the encouraging response of the Japanese audience to Cebu Pacific Japan’s engagement efforts and consistently outstanding media conversion rates, We can confidently forecast a sunny future for Cebu Pacific Air in terms of overall revenue and presence in the Japanese market, despite being fairly new in the market and with some competitive high fliers.

IH Digital has been working hand in hand with Cebu Pacific for its exposure in Japan – keeping an eagle’s eye on exploring more potent opportunities for the airline while maintaining a strong connection with its budget-seeking and practical audience. As its digital efforts hover above the rest, Cebu Pacific Air continues to soar high like flying on a clear summer sky: a match made in heaven.

Visit Cebu Pacific Japan Facebook page for more information.

Vitagen Singapore: The Foodies’ Best Friend

Resisting temptation is difficult, and Vitagen Singapore knows it.  Making its move to be known as a healthy partner for foodies across Singapore, Vitagen launched its Facebook App Gut To Have It With Vitagen, promoting balance as an important ingredient in a healthy diet. Participants share the most indulgent of their guilty eats, while balancing it out with their very own Vitagen captions.

Through this app, Vitagen Singapore aims to improve brand awareness among its target audience. To make it more interesting for the app users, participants can also stand a chance to win one of the 2D1N Staycation at Hotel Fort Canning or exciting weekly prizes. All it takes is a one good photo shot and a handful of votes! In this way, Vitagen Singapore will be able to hold more of its viewers’ attention and get them to participate in the photo contest.

The app runs from 22 September to 20 October.

Vitagen Singapore’s Gut To Have It With Vitagen Facebook App was developed by IH Digital.

A purpose-driven social media contest

Small things truly make a big difference. This is how Panasonic Singapore applies its philosophy of contributing to society through social media. Known to many, most of Panasonic products are eco-friendly, which are labelled ECONAVI. This time, through its campaign called iPledge & My Moment, Panasonic has once again shown its commitment to the environment by inviting people’s support and participation.

The Facebook app has its main features divided into 2 – iPledge Contest and My Moment Contest. In the iPledge Contest feature, Panasonic’s audience can largely contribute to the society by making a simple pledge for the environment and sharing it with their friends through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. Panasonic Singapore’s iPledge Contest is currently running its second year as an app. In as easy as sharing a pledge for the environment, participants can instantly stand a chance to win special prizes. On the other hand, My Moment is another feature that basically ties in with the event Straits Times Run at the Hub 2014, wherein Panasonic holds main sponsorship. Similar to the iPledge feature, My Moment gives participants a chance to get hold of special prizes.

With IH Digital’s expertise, the Facebook app was created with a strategic plan following a specific purpose – which is to drive the interest of people towards the brand through social media. And at the same time, make it an easy and enjoyable experience to the users.

The campaign started 28 September and will end 31 October. While it’s up, take a tour around the application and see how this can be effective for your brand too.

Panasonic Singapore’s iPledge & My Moment app was developed by IH Digital.

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